


The White Dragon

by missing_europe



Category: 12 Monkeys (TV), Fringe
Genre: Alternate Universe - Science Fiction, Fluff, Friendship, Gen, Getting high
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-06-13
Updated: 2015-06-13
Packaged: 2018-04-04 05:36:27
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 5
Words: 3,807
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4127107
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/missing_europe/pseuds/missing_europe
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>What if Cole met Walter Bishop? They'd get high and eat disgusting food.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Cheesequake

With a low rumble, everything in the lab started to tremble ominously. Beakers rattled their way haphazardly across the table. The hanging lights strobed on and off through low electric hisses. Walter dove for one of the roving beakers in the nick of time, just as it threatened to take its final step off the edge of the table. Letting out a sigh of happy relief, Walter held the beaker close to his chest like a baby.

“Oh thank goodness. It would have taken me another twelve hours just to cultivate more of this worm spleen solution. The enzyme of this rare creature contains an active ingredient which I am using to synthesize the flavour of a homemade vanilla cherry cheesecake.”

Astrid’s face involuntary contorted in revulsion, but Walter didn’t notice. He looked so pleased with himself that she couldn’t help but soften. “Walter, you know if you want cheesecake, I can just go out and pick some up for you. It’s really not a problem.”

“Don’t be silly Astrix. You can’t add a strawberry cheesecake to a cup of tea or a cocktail, but I can add this solution to one. And I bet it goes very well with bacon. I’ve almost got it. Just have to remove the last protein that adds an unwanted flavour of sulphur. This might just be it. You really must try it sometime, Ester. It’s wonderful stuff.”

“Oh… no thanks Walter. I’m not much of a sweet tooth.” Evaded Astrid sheepishly.

“Nonsense!” Walter started to tidy up the rattled equipment. “Do you know what that was Astro?”

“I don’t know Walter. Do you think it was an earthquake?”

“I don’t think so. You see, I developed a special seismic response mechanism which is currently attached to Gene over there, and it clearly shows no sign of having detected any seismic activity. Don’t worry, it doesn’t hurt her.”

Astrid’s eyes clouded over with a confused but gentle expression. She looked at Walter patiently for further elucidation. 

“Oh, haven’t I told you about this device? It’s very clever actually. In the event of an earthquake, the seismic energy will trigger the device so that it would automatically dispense a soothing and rhythmic massage, like so, across Gene’s back.” Walter hopped over to Gene giddily and brushed her coat with his palms like a side rod in motion on a train. “It’s to keep her calm, obviously. We can’t have a panicked cow stampeding across the lab!”

As Walter caressed his pet cow, the doors to the lab flew opened violently with a loud bang, startling poor Gene, who let out a pitiful distress moo. Walter and Astrid jumped up at the sound. Walter almost dropped his beaker, but caught it just in time. He licked at the droplets that spilt onto his hand, nodding to himself in quiet approval at the improvement in flavour.


	2. Strangers

Snapping his attention back towards the intrusion, Walter saw a bent over figure by the door. Cole had barged into the lab and was clutching at his chest as if he were in pain, but at the same time, he looked like a hurt animal that would bite if it felt threatened. As far as Walter was concerned, this was a man he did not recognise. He felt a little afraid. Astrid must have felt the same, because she was now hiding behind Walter, grabbing onto his lab coat and peeking over his shoulder.

Feigning moxy, Walter mustered up his best authoritative voice to question this wild intruder. “And who are you? You’re not from the Fringe Unit. What are you doing in my lab?”

“Lab? Fringe Unit? Wait. What year is it?” Cole was definitely very confused. His eyes scanned across the lab, clearly unable to make sense of his surroundings. He tried to stand up straight but instantly fell, rolling ungracefully down the few steps into an untidy bundle on the ground.

Astrid rushed out from behind Walter and crouched down by Cole, taking his head into her hands to examine the nasty bump now growing on his temple. She touched it gently, satisfied that it was just superficial. “It’s 2015. What year do you think it is?” She asked in a soothing tone.

Hissing back the pain, Cole gulped in some air, and steadied himself with his hands on the ground and pushed himself into a seating position. He shielded his eyes from one of the lamps, which was shining straight into his eyes. Astrid noticed Cole’s grimace and immediately rushed to shut off the lamp. Cole blinked hard to bring some moisture back to his parched eyes, and looked around to survey his new surroundings.

“It’s 2015 where I came from too. Something is not right here. This is not my 2015. I don’t recognise any of you, or any of this.” He lifted one arm with a pointed finger and panned it across the room, a simple gesture that seemed to send his head spinning. “Wait. This is a lab. Is this Spearhead? Are you Foster? Are you working with Markridge or the Army of the Twelve Monkeys?”

“Slow down, young man. I haven’t the foggiest idea what you’re talking about. Spearhead? A simian army? We don’t drink Fosters here. Firstly, that’s not beer, and besides, I prefer absinth or moonshine. This is Harvard University. I’m Dr Walter Bishop, co-founder of Kelvin Genetics, now Massive Dynamic. Does that ring any bells?” 

Cole shook his head. Walter smiled with gentle pity but found himself lost for words himself. Everyone looked at each other in silent confusion. At least they all spoke English, and that was something, because that was the only part that made any immediate sense to each other.


	3. Blue Glitch

Just then, a blond woman strode into the lab, unaware of the commotion that preceded her arrival. Cole couldn’t see her face. 

“Cassie?” A hopeful shout of wild recognition escaped from him. His happy expression faded into instant disappointment the moment she turned to face him, as he realised his mistake. Olivia Dunham regarded Cole coolly, a tight smile on her lips.

“Sorry, it's the hair. I thought you were someone else.” A sad expression fell across Cole’s face.

Ignoring him, Olivia turned to Walter and asked in haste: “Have you seen Peter? Broyles has just called in an incident. There’s been a temporal interference and we need to make sure that it hasn’t caused a new tear between dimensions… outside of… the… bridge...” 

Olivia’s voice trailed off as she slowly turned to study the strange man in the lab. She was blatantly staring at him now with a pensive expression. Cole’s face scrunched up uneasily, and he hugged his jacket closer to himself. He didn’t like that she was looking at him weird.

“You’re glitching,” Said Olivia, with hesitant uncertainty in her voice, “but I haven’t seen this glitch before. You’re not from our world. How did you get here? Who are you?”

Cole’s eyes narrowed in suspicion, as he considered what to say next. “My name is Cole. I’m from 2043 but I now live in 2015. I know this might sound weird and hard to believe, but…” 

Walter cut Cole off. “Actually, in this lab, we specialise in the investigation of the weird and the hard to believe. I have even talked to the dead to solve their murders. I can assure you it’s all perfectly scientific! You’re a time traveller? Splendid! I’ve been waiting all my life to meet one! You’re the first, if we don’t count the observers, of course. You have too much hair to be an observer.”

Cole raised his hand self-consciously to his head and pulled lightly on a strand of hair hanging from behind his ear. 

“But that’s not what I meant, Walter. I don’t mean that Cole isn’t from our time. The observers don’t glitch. Walter, his glitch is blue. Peter’s is yellow. Walternet’s is yellow. Fauxlivia’s is yellow. Walter, how many alternate universes are there out there?” Olivia didn’t want to think about the implications. 

Walter was already circling Cole with curiosity, bringing his eyes a few centimetres away from Cole’s, which had grown stiff and wide with panic. He didn’t like feeling like a scientific specimen. Walter took out a wooden lollipop stick and started to prod the bags under Cole’s eye. Cole swatted his hand away and stared hard into Walter’s kindly aged face.

“Sorry, got carried away. In theory, infinite, Olivia. But I had only created a rift between two worlds. Something extraordinary must happen for someone from a third of many possible universes to travel into ours.”

Cole didn’t like it that they were talking as if he wasn’t in the room, so he interrupted. “Ok, stop. Walter and Olivia, is it? I’ve been through a time machine many times before and the only time I ended up in an alternate universe, was when something in the past changed. But the people were mostly the same. None of you were in my timeline in 2015 or 2043! And this time I wasn’t even at the time machine when I splintered. I don’t know how that’s possible, but I definitely splintered.”

Walter looked lost in thought, mumbling to himself with his finger ticking away like a metronome. A thought seemed to have settled on Walter’s mind. “That’s possible if you have come to us from a distant alternate universe, one very different from ours. In theory, our universes don’t have to have anything in common. Tell me Mr Cole, did something extraordinary happen before your last, erm, what did you call it? Splinter? Was there something that happened that didn’t happen before all those other times you travelled through time?”

Cole slapped his forehead with his hand with a pained expression. “Of course. I was resurrected by a paradox. I was injected with blood from my younger self to save my life – to undo the quantum shifting in my cells from all the time travel. I suppose that counts as extraordinary. Look, I don’t know how this happened either. All I know is that I lost someone very important to me in 2015 to 2043. It’s not safe there, in 2043 I mean. The virus had destroyed the world and Cassie deserves better than to be in the apocalypse. I wanted to get her back. I was thinking about that when I splintered without the machine.”

“Well, two thoughts have just occurred to me. Firstly, I may have a hypothesis. I’m sure it’s perfectly scientific. And if I’m right, the good news is, you’re not stuck here for long.”

“Well, that is good news.” Sighed Cole. There is still hope for him to find a way back to Cassie, and that’s all that mattered.

“May I take a sample from you, Mr Cole? You’ll be happy to know that Olivia here is the only other person I know who can travel between worlds at will, because cortexiphan has allowed her brain to develop extraordinary neural pathways. Perhaps this paradox of yours has gifted you with similar abilities to Olivia. If you have the same abilities, then I just need to give you some LSD and put you in that tank, and in theory, you should be able to go back.”

“Cortexiwhat? LSD? What’s that?” Cole was used to time travelling, but going into another world, surrounded by things that don’t exist in his world, is a whole new level of confusing.

“Don’t worry about that. Leave the science to me. Just let me see if your brain chemistry shares the same structures as Olivia’s, then we’ll take it from there.”

“And what’s the second thought you had, Walter?” asked Astrid, but she thinks she already knows the answer.

“Ah! My peanut butter, bacon and egg pie! I almost forgot that I had that in the oven. Aspero, can you get that out of the oven please? I think it’s ready now.” He didn’t even have to ask. She was already on her way.

Olivia was silent the whole time, amazed at the possibility that this stranger could also be another interdimensional jumper. Until today, she thought she was the only one, and it was a lonely thought. Olivia’s phone vibrated and she quickly turned to check the screen. “It’s Peter. He’s already at the scene. I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go right away.”

“But I just need a sample from you to compare to Mr Coles.” Pleaded Walter.

“Can it wait? I’ll be back as soon as I can. This can’t wait. Time is of the essence if this is an unstable tear.” Before anyone can protest, Olivia had already whisked out of the lab.


	4. The White Dragon in the Clouds

“So what do we do now?” Asked Cole, exasperated at the prospect of losing time. He was worried about Cassie. 

“Oh, don’t worry, dear boy. She’ll probably be back within an hour or two. Why don’t you sit back so that I can take a sample from you and start the sequencing? Aspirin! Can you bring me the drill – it’s by the door – and that 10cc hypodermic syringe? It’s next to the jar of sausages in the fridge.”

“Whoa. Wait. What are you going to do to me?”

“Oh, don’t worry, nothing I haven’t done to myself already. I just need to drill a small hole into your skull and extract a small amount of fluid from the part of your brain that controls your perceptions. If you have the same brain chemistry as Olivia, the chemicals I am looking for would be most concentrated in those parts.”

Cole regarded Walter coolly, edging his toe towards the door as if considering whether to make a run for it.

Noting his nervousness, Astrid chimed in. “It will be fine, Cole. I’ve seen Walter do this procedure safely several times. Please don’t worry. We’re here to help.” 

He might not have met this Astrid lady before, but for some reason Cole felt he could trust her. So he took a seat on the chair and stopped making a fuss. He was thinking about what a bad combination Cassie and West VII would be, and just wished that there was something that he could do to get her out of there.

Walter, also having sensed Cole’s unease, came towards him with a plastic mask attached to a clear tube. Cole didn’t see what the tube was attached to, but Astrid’s serene gaze was enough to stop him from asking anymore questions. “Here, put this around your nose and mouth and breathe in when I tell you to. Ready? Ok, breathe in now. Nice and steady.” Cole listened to Walter’s voice and did as he was told.

As Cole breathed in, a strong pungent vapour filled his lungs. It smelled like concentrated wet grass and earth, which made him think about being in the outdoors. A sudden rush came over his head and his neck lolled softly backwards. His eyes rolled up into his head as wave after wave of goosebumps danced up and down his body, relaxing all the tense nerves bundled in his neck and chest. When he opened his eyes again, he felt his eyelids heavy in a pleasing way, the way that eyes usually only feel after a certain kind of release with a beautiful woman. 

“Whao… what was that? I feel… nice and light. I never feel nice and light. This is… unusual.” Cole, confused at his own quaint choice of words, descended into a fit of giggles. 

“It’s Brown Betty. A hybrid of chronic supernova and Afghani kush. When filtered through this custom vapouriser, it’s the smoothest delivery system. You should feel relaxed. Your worries can wait.”

“Whatever you’ve done, it’s magic to me. I have just been tense and coiled, in fight mode, for, well, forever, in all my living memory. I have never been relaxed. But here I am. Floating away.”  
Cole grabbed the plastic mask to his face again and breathed in long and hard. After what seemed like ten seconds, he coughed out a giant fug of white smoke from his nose with a silly smile on his face. He giggled once again as he poked his fingers through the cloud of smoke.

“Easy now, this cannabis is very strong. I created it especially for seasoned veteran smokers like me, so you should be quite away with the fairies. Now, if you just hold still a little longer, I’m almost done extracting the brain fluid sample. Then I can join you for a smoke.” Walter looked at Astrid almost guiltily. “Since we’re waiting for Olivia, I mean.” 

Astrid just shook her head endearingly at Walter, but already all trace of guilt had left his face as he popped the half-filled syringe into Astrid’s hand, and took the plastic mask gleefully over his own face and breathed in deeply. A silly smile smudged itself across Walter’s face almost instantaneously. “I think I surpassed myself with this particular crop.”

“You know Walter…” Cole gestured clumsily with his hands over his head, hitting his own face by mistake, although showing no sign of having felt it. “You know, I’ve never tried any of this where I came from. I don’t think I’ve ever felt so relaxed. Hmmm…” Cole hummed with satisfaction, as he smacked his lips lazily. “This chair is the most comfortable chair I’ve ever sat in. It’s like being enveloped in a cloud. My head feels like a pillow, just floating in the clouds.”

“Oh, I do envy those who get to try cannabis for the first time. Enjoy this, Mr Cole.”

Cole chuckled again, this time with tears streaming down his face. “Why do all scientists call me Mr Cole? _Mr Cole. Mr Cole._ ” He mimicked in a hoarse comedic voice. “It sounds so formal and serious. And here I thought it was a German thing. But now I know it’s a science thing.”

Walter’s face perched up at Cole’s amusement. Walter looked to Cole like a startled owl, which was the most hilarious thing to him in that moment. Cole was clutching at his sides, laughing so hard that sometimes, no sound would come out of his mouth for a few seconds until the pent up laughter pushes its way out twice as strong. 

Walter couldn’t help but snort out a short laugh at first. But this just set Cole off into further hysteria. And then there was absolutely no way that Walter could escape from the infectious roars and howls. Both their faces streamed with tears. They were a very silly sight to behold. Even Astrid couldn’t help but chuckle behind her hand. She had to walk away from them if she was to get any work done at all. She put on some music to drown out the ruckus. 

“Stop… laughing… I can’t… I can’t… HAHAHAHAHAHA…. Breathe!”

But each time they looked at each other, their laughing faces looked so silly to each other, they just couldn’t stop. The sides of their faces started to hurt from laughing so much.

“OK, I will count to three, and both of us stop laughing together. Ok? One, two, three!”

They sat holding their breaths, looking at each other through ludicrously wet eyes, attempting to look sombre and serious. He really tried not to, but Walter’s lips started to quiver back against a poorly suppressed laugh. “I think I just pissed myself. It’s just a squirt.” 

Cole pinched his nose and closed his eyes shut, hoping that it would be enough to keep the growing hysteria inside him at bay. Just as his breathing seemed to be calm down back to normal, Walter said: “You know, I am from Germany.” 

Cole’s valiant effort to stop laughing completely fell apart and he was rolling on the floor once again, howling like a deranged hyena. “I knew it! In every timeline and universe, the smoking mad scientist is always German!”


	5. Hug from the Inside

Only the rumbles in their bellies finally brought Walter and Cole to heel. Without the deafening roar of laughter, Cole finally heard that there was music percolating throughout the lab. Astrid, in a bid to try to create a chemical profile of Cole’s brain fluid, had put on some Frank Sinatra to help her ignore the two stoned men behaving like silly children.

“I love music! Turn that up! There’s no music in the apocalypse. This is great! Nice. I hope this music exists back in my world.” Cole shouted with joyous abandon. He hummed along to the tune for a moment, as if eager to commit the whole tune to memory. “I wish Cassie could listen to this music with me. This guy is genius.”

“If only you had more time here, I have a huge collection of music that I would only be too happy to share.”

“Be careful what you wish for, Walter. If it turns out that I can step between my world and your world at will, I might just be back before you know it to take you up on that! But right now, I am so hungry!”

“Peanut butter, bacon and egg pie?” Walter suggested playfully. He was dancing around the room twirling with the pie, whistling Fly Me To The Moon with joyful abandon. 

“Oh, thanks. Don’t mind me.” Before Walter could explain that this was a new flavour combination that he was experimenting on, Cole took the whole pie and tore off a large chunk with his hand, stuffing it into his face. “Mmmm. Oh. Yum. Not bad. Not bad at all. And this bit here, tastes like cheesecake. Who’d’ve thought these flavours would work so well together! I’m liking the stuff in your world, Walter. You, sir, can cook a mean pie. I should adopt you as my father from another dimension.” 

Within seconds, the whole pie disappeared down Cole’s throat. Walter looked astonished that someone else liked his food, and also a little gobsmacked that he didn’t get a piece. 

Wiping his hands on his shirt, Cole let out a satisfied burp. But a short moment later, he looked up at Walter, confused. “I think I’m still hungry. I am such a pig.”

“Happy as a pig in muck, my son from another dimension. The munchies are the best bit! Cannabis not only possess the power to free your mind of worries, it also frees the appetite and heightens the brain’s ability to process flavour. Everything tastes ten times as good on the munchies. Asteroid! Can you order some pizza? I think we will have the mighty meteor!”

When Walter turned back to Cole, Cole was passed out on the chair. Walter didn’t seem to mind. He reached for the plastic mask and took in another deep breath, and danced around the lab some more, like a delighted sugar plum fairy, whilst he continued to wait for Olivia’s return.


End file.
